RED WING, Minn. -- Red Wing police are investigating an abduction-rape case reported Thursday. According to preliminary reports, a 17-year-old Red Wing girl was walking at sunset on South Park Street between Ninth and 12th streets when she was approached by two men. The men, who were not known to the victim, struck her over the head and put her into a vehicle, police said. The girl told officers she was then taken to another location, where the men sexually assaulted her. The men later released her and she walked home, Capt.

ST. PAUL - Another Minnesota State Fair has come and gone, Republicans ended their national convention and kids are back in school. So, are you ready for the state's primary election Tuesday? If it seems like the election snuck up on you, you're not alone.

ST. PAUL - The only thing more unusual than U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman's primary election opponent's residence may be the Republican challenger's stated intent for running. Voters who visit Jack Shepard's campaign Web site can view a video in which Shepard talks of the importance of booting Coleman from office - to help Democrats gain a larger majority. Shepard's "positions on issues are 100 percent similar to Democratic Senate candidate Al Franken," his Web site says.

ST. PAUL - One candidate touts his experience as a U.S. senator - all eight official days of it. Another tests the limits of Internet-based campaigning with quirky messages like calling for an end to the penny. Still another believes cleaning house in Congress will allow for new ideas just as torching a prairie promotes new plant growth. Welcome to the Independence Party's U.S. Senate primary, where some of the seven candidates use folksy shtick to make up for thin campaign wallets in their long-shot efforts to give Minnesotans an alternative to Republican Sen.

WORTHINGTON -- The workers' compensation system needs to be reformed, said Steve Sviggum, Minnesota's Commissioner of Labor and Industry Tuesday at Travelodge in Worthington. "The system needs reform now before it becomes chaos," Sviggum said to an audience of approximately 20 area residents and business leaders. The workers' compensation system's last major reform was in 1995, Sviggum said, and since then two trends have dominated the program. First, workplace injuries have dramatically decreased. Second, the cost per case of those workplace injuries has significantly increased.

ST. PAUL - Hillary Clinton tried to replace a question mark about her support of Barack Obama Tuesday night with an exclamation point. "Barack Obama is my candidate," Clinton told a raucous Democratic National Convention crowd. "And he must be our president." The New York senator and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, had been harsh on Obama during the presidential primary election and caucus season. There had been concern among some Democrats that the party would continue to show divisions. Clinton told delegates to put that fight behind them.

UPPER SIOUX AGENCY STATE PARK -- A mother and daughter were taken into custody when they protested a historical re-enactment at the Upper Sioux Agency State Park on Saturday. Dr. Angela Wilson of Granite Falls, who has a doctorate in Dakota history and studies and goes by her Dakota name Waziyata Win, and her daughter, Autumn Wilson who also goes by her Dakota name Winuna, were part of a counter event to protest the historical re-enactment of life at the Upper Sioux Agency in 1858.

A federal lawsuit filed by a former Cook County High School student claiming his constitutional rights were violated when he wrote an essay about killing a teacher has been struck down again. On Friday, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the lawsuit's dismissal last year by a federal judge. The three-judge panel found that David Riehm's essay was a "true threat" and not protected by the First Amendment as Riehm and his mother, Colleen Riehm of Grand Portage, had claimed. The panel found no fault in the way the school district and county officials responded.

ST. PAUL - Small schools in rural Minnesota fared best in the latest round of federal education assessments, but even they are part of a statewide trend of fewer schools meeting the standards. Nearly 60 percent of schools in greater Minnesota made adequate yearly progress under the federal No Child Left Behind law. In the seven-county Twin Cities area, 40 percent of schools met the requirements for 2008, according to new Minnesota Department of Education data. Statewide, just over half of schools posted sufficient gains.